Legal Murder

Legal Murder: It Could Have Been You!

A mother kills her baby because she does not want it, yet she is not charged with murder. Is this right? Believe it or not, this has happened more than twenty million times in the past twenty years (Endicott, lecture notes). Because of abortion, these deaths take place legally. Abortion is the termination of a pregnancy after, accompanied by, resulting in, or closely followed by the death of the embryo or fetus (Merriam-Webster Online). The morality of abortion is one of the most argued issues in today’s society. The definition of personhood and when human life begins is pivotal in determining whether or not abortion is morally permissible. While few contest that human beings have the right to life, some reject the premise that the unborn are human beings. There is much debate over where to draw the line between a human and non-human. Persons have the right to life; because life begins at conception the unborn are human beings and, thus, have the right to live.

In the article “Responding to Person: Methods of Moral Argument in Debate over Abortion”, John T. Noonan Jr. argues that a fetus is a person because of the presence of a full genetic code (Noonan, 294). An unborn fetus becomes a human being at the point of conception because they carry the potential to become a viable, functional human being. Noonan presents a strong argument that if human parents conceive you, you are in fact human. Because a fetus is a human being that possesses a full genetic code, it is immoral to have an abortion. Like many pro-life advocates, Noonan argues that abortion is only morally permissible in cases that will save the mother’s life (Pojman, 569).

Defenders of abortion contend that an unborn fetus is not a person. Pro-choice advocate, Mary Anne Warren, believes that one can only be considered a human being if he or she is a member of the moral community (Pojman, 576). In an article entitled, “The Moral and Legal Status of Abortion”, Warren argues that a member of the moral community must exhibit five character traits: consciousness, reasoning, self-motivated activity, the capacity to communicate, and the presence of self-concepts and self-awareness. Warren’s definition of a human is established solely by her opinion and is widely discredited.

Based on Warren’s criteria, not every human being meets the requirements of personhood. There are many examples of human beings that would not pass the personhood test. There are newborns, infants, toddlers, adolescents, and even some adults that would fail to be classified as humans based on these criteria, the soundest example being newborns. There is no scientific evidence to show that there is a significant difference between the fetus in the womb and a newborn. If one is to say it is permissible to kill a fetus, they are also to say it is permissible to kill a newborn baby.

Life, defined by the Encyclopedia Britannica, is “a material complex or individual characterized by the capacity to perform certain functional activities, including metabolism, growth, reproduction, and some form of responsiveness and adaptation.” Human embryos display all of these characteristics at the point of conception. Therefore a fertilized embryo is, without a doubt, alive. Every human being has the to right to live. At conception, the unborn become human beings. Therefore one cannot deny the conclusion that, like any other human being, a fetus has the unconditional right to life. Some, like Warren, claim that life does not begin until the child is born. From a scientific point of view, this argument is invalid; life begins at conception.

Abortion